Stay secure and private

Once you’ve created a password for your Google Account, we encourage you to add an
extra layer of security by enabling 2-step verification. 2-step verification
requires you to have access to your phone, as well as your username and password, when
you sign in. This means that if someone steals or guesses your password, the potential
attacker still can’t sign in to your account because they don’t have your phone. Now
you can protect yourself with something you know (your password) and something you have
(your phone).

In incognito mode, pages you open and files you download aren’t recorded in Chrome’s
browsing or download history. You can also use this feature in Chrome for Android – and
Chrome is now the default browser for new Android products, letting you browse the web
on your phone or tablet in private. Find out how to
access incognito mode.

Google Talk, the chat feature in Gmail and other Google products, allows you to
take chats off the record.
Chats that have been taken off the record aren’t stored in your or your contact’s Gmail
chat history. When you take a chat off the record, a message will appear to you and
your contact confirming that future chats won’t be saved, unless one of you changes the
setting.

Google+ circles help you manage your friends and contacts. You can put your friends in
one circle, your family in another and your boss in a circle all by himself – just like
real life. Then you can share relevant content, like Google+ posts, YouTube videos, or
Local listings, with the right people anytime you choose.

YouTube was created for people to share ideas with the entire world. But sometimes you
might just rather share it with a small group of friends or keep it to yourself. You
can do that by choosing either unlisted or private when you upload your video.

See and control your information

The Google Dashboard shows you what’s stored in your Google Account. From one central
location, you can easily view and update your settings for services such as Blogger,
Calendar, Docs, Gmail, Google+ and more.

Me on the Web can help you understand and manage what people see when they search for
you on Google. It helps you set up Google Alerts so you can monitor if information
about you appears online, and it automatically suggests some search terms you may want
to keep an eye on.

Account Activity makes it simple for you to review how you’re using Google services
while signed in, and make sure only you have been using your account. If you sign up,
you’ll get access to a monthly report where you can see things like how much email has
been sent and received from your account, the countries from which your account has
been accessed, and what the top Google searches from your account have been.

Google Takeout provides you with an easy-to-use tool to download your personal data,
like your documents or photos, so that you can always have a copy of it or easily be
able to upload your information to another service.

If you’re signed in to a Google Account, Web History helps provide you with more
relevant results and recommendations. If you choose, you can delete entries, pause
collection or turn off the service altogether. You can do the same with YouTube History.

Manage what advertisers and websites see

Ads help fund many of the free online services on the web you love and use every day.
With Google’s Ads Preferences Manager, you can understand how ads are selected for you,
control your information that is used to select ads, and block specific advertisers.

Google Analytics generates statistics about visitors to websites, such as the number of
page views or times of peak traffic to help website publishers improve their sites. If
you don’t want your browser data to be shared with publishers when you visit sites that
use Google Analytics, you can install an opt-out.